Author
Topic: A Cut-Out that ended up not being a cut out (Read 1171 times)

I got a call from my friend who said she had bees flying in her house. She lives in a two story home with brick on the first floor and red wood cedar on the second. A woodpecker made an inch and a half sized opening in the wood siding. By the time I made it out there it was getting dark, but there were SEVERAL dozen bees flying in and out of the entrance. My friend also told me they were making it inside the home, and she sprayed and killed about 50 of them.

From the looks of it, they were nesting in between the floor joists. I told her I would come back another day (when there is light available) and remove them for her. The next day, when I got off work at 5, she called me and said her father was cutting apart the house and spraying them. I ran over as quick as I could to try and stop him.

To my surprise, he had already opened up the entrance. The entrance didn't go in between the floor joists, but was located underneath a bath tub. There were still several dozen bees going to and from the entrance, but there was no comb. We thought they might be in between the walls below the tub, or on the other side of the tub. We ended up tearing up several walls, and found several bees flying around, but no colony. It was very perplexing.

I've seen scout bees checking the entrance of cavities before but I've never seen a few hundred checking out the entrance before, and never for two or three consecutive days.

I told my friend we couldn't find the colony, but I would put a swarm trap outside in case they were in the area. I checked on the swarm trap yesterday and BINGO it's full of bees. I havn't had the chance to open it up yet and inspect, but from the feel of it the swarm was about 4 or 5 lbs. A good catch.

I'm happy it worked out in the end, even though I spent 3 hours tearing open walls for no reason :D

.....The greatest changes occur in their country without their cooperation. They are not even aware of precisely what has taken place. They suspect it; they have heard of the event by chance. More than that, they are unconcerned with the fortunes of their village, the safety of their streets, the fate of their church and its vestry. They think that such things have nothing to do with them, that they belong to a powerful stranger called the government. They enjoy these goods as tenants, without a sense of ownership, and never give a thought to how they might be improved.....

I checked on them today, and the swarm was MUCH larger than I thought. The swarm trap was a 5 frame deep, but when I opened them I don't know how they all fit in there. I run all mediums, so I tried to transfer them into a medium 5 frame nuc and it was apparent that wasn't going to happen, so I put a 5 frame super on top of it (mediums), giving them 10 frames total. They fit, but there are plenty of them in there. I might have to give them more room in the next week or so . . . can't decide . . .